


this one’s for believing (if only for its sake)

by rashaka



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Bellamy swears a lot, Drama, F/M, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Humor, Romance, Worldbuilding, because seriously that guy would fucking swear all the time, grounders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-09
Updated: 2015-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-24 16:59:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2589254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rashaka/pseuds/rashaka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"They call themselves the Shenandoah Clan," Clarke whispered against his neck. Each syllable seeped from her lips into his skin, sinking below the sweat and the bits of earth to swim inside Bellamy’s awareness. They were close enough that if she hadn’t breathed to speak at all, he’d still make out the words. She spoke again: "We should call them that, too. We can’t afford the disrespect."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Terapsina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Terapsina/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic comes with a playlist, [enjoy it here](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRCz1SK3IuAHz0vtmM_UlnYVsoJXlJYut).
> 
>  I wrote this during the first few episodes of s2, even before Clarke and Bellamy were reunited (or the stuff with Finn) so it's canon divergent right from the start. I'm really proud of this story, but looking back on it, Clarke turned out to be way more of a grown up bad ass in s2 than I predicted. This makes me so happy, but it does mean my fic's a bit out of date. I hope you enjoy it though! And if you do, please drop me a comment. Comments are love.
> 
>  

_This one's for the faithless, the ones that are surprised_  
_They're only where they are now regardless of their fight_  
_This one's for believing (if only for its sake)_  
_Come on friends get up now, love is to be made_

 

"They call themselves the Shenandoah Clan," Clarke whispered against his neck. Each syllable seeped from her lips into his skin, sinking below the sweat and the bits of earth to swim inside Bellamy’s awareness. They were close enough that if she hadn’t breathed to speak at all, he’d still make out the words. She spoke again: "We should call them that, too. We can’t afford the disrespect."

 

He tucked her legs more firmly under his arms, hiking her up for leverage, and ran the list through his head. No firearms, no compass. Clarke had a head wound and no shoes. One canteen left, two long knives, and a handful of Grounder refugees.

 

This raid on Mount Weather would go down in Abby’s records as a spectacular failure compared to previous three: only half a dozen Grounders were freed, none of their own friends, and two guardsmen from Camp Jaha were dead under the Mountain Men's escalating security traps. 

 

He felt it when Clarke twisted around partway to see the straggling, half-starved people stagger to a halt alongside them.  She'd asked Bellamy to carry one of them instead—there was a young man who swayed dangerously on the hike—but no chance on this fucking planet was he going to let Clarke The Indomitable try to lead the way barefoot with a possible concussion. 

 

A day and a half's march from danger found them all together on a hillside, eyes cast out over a village no one from the Ark had seen before.  Was it worth it?  New alliances were good in theory, but with their experience on the surface so far, absolutely wretched in practice.

 

"Here," said a woman with circle tattoos running across her collarbone and above her brow. She licked chapped lips and stretched out one hand to indicate the farm land, the corralled animals, and twisting, glittering river that cut the valley in half.  A red and pink sunset made the whole thing coalesce into the most vivid picture Bellamy had ever seen.

 

The village woman's English was rough but perfectly audible: "Shenandoah. We're going home."

 

The Grounders—at least the Shenandoah in the group—believed this place was safe.  A couple of them probably lived here. That was enough for Clarke.  

 

It also wasn't anywhere near Anya's territory, and that was enough for Bellamy.

 

"Lead the way."  When he nodded at the woman, she began picking a path down the open hillside, brazen as you please. The others followed, slow from weariness and injury, while he remained on the cliff with his hands braced like rigid steel traps under Clarke's thighs.

 

He took two deep breaths.

 

Approaching like this from the open was a good way to get shot.  Arrows, crossbows, maybe this plucky clan were into javelins. Particularly when the ones being shot at dress more like the enemy than a fellow villager.

 

"Come on," Clarke urged, tucking her face down to say the words right into his ear.  "We don't want to be out here alone."

 

Some actions are involuntary: catching a ball from the air, reaching for a weapon in a moment of fear, leaning his head against hers when she's wrapped around him so tight she's become the very voice in his mind.

 

"Yeah," he agreed. Her hair smelled like forest loam.  "No time like the present."

 

Down Bellamy went, placing one foot over another.  Across rocks and shrubs, with his friend on his back and his new allies in front, he left the terrors of Mount Weather to wail in the darkness behind them.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> These people were Earth's version of the fucking Council for all he knew, deciding if the troublesome prisoners lived or died.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whelp...more. more exists. 
> 
> This fic comes with a playlist, [enjoy it here](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRCz1SK3IuAHz0vtmM_UlnYVsoJXlJYut). It's the music I wrote to.

One thing the Shenandoah had in plenty was wool. Blankets, curtains, clothes: everything was spun. 

 

"Did you see how many sheep they have?" Clarke asked while they sat on a bench outside what had to be the leader's house, as if Bellamy had blithely missed the several hundred creatures wandering along the riverbank.  

 

Two armed men and an armed woman watched them from various distances, arrows knocked.  One of the men was lazy and distracted, always looking at the woman, but she and the other one seemed perfectly cool with the idea of killing a couple of sky invanders.  

 

"This is what  _we_  need to do," Clarke continued.  "Trade livestock, start breeding animals and making things.  We could have this, you know."

 

 She had one foot up across her knee, and while chatting she plucked tiny pieces of rock and metal out of her skin.  The sight of red, upwelling blood caught Bellamy's attention, until he realized that no amount of pointed staring would make her stop.  In the end he looked away to keep from being ill at the gorey meticulousness of it.  How she could even manage ad-hoc surgery in the falling twilight, he didn't want to ask.

 

If she wanted his opinion, speculating was a waste of time.  Nonetheless, Bellamy hoped if they stayed out here in full view of the citizenry long enough, eventually someone had to offer Clarke something to clean up.

 

"Sheep," he snorted.  He glanced again at her bent, blond head, fixated on the way her hair spilled across his jacket where their shoulders touched.  "Your mom can’t even keep her own people from disappearing.  I’m not holding out any hope we could manage animals."

 

Clarke tsked-tsked. "I'm just saying, Bellamy, remember this.  Save it in the back of your mind.  We need allies, we need  _anyone_  at this point, and it's convenient they hate Mount Weather as much as we do."

 

As words go, 'hate' didn't accurately convey the vociferous cursing, shouting, and weapons-brandishing these people directed at the forest.  According to Yesenia, the refugee with the circle tattoos, the Mountain Men were demon spawn that crawled up out of the shit of forest pigs. 

 

"They won't follow you here, because they don’t leave the trees.  Cowards.”  She didn't quite spit after the word, but she might as well have with the way she flicked her fingers east.  "They know if they stray too far the air will poison their rotten souls.  A knife helps too."

 

If the Grounder's assessment was frighteningly macabre, it was validated by Clarke’s matching expression.  For the hundredth time in weeks, Bellamy was glad he’d never been forced to see inside that place. 

 

Conversations like the rant from Yesenia peppered their first hours.  Despite the presense of weapon-ready babysitters, the Shenandoah as a whole seemed less interested in interrogating Clarke and Bellamy than in tending to their own.  Eventually someone remembered the two outsiders, and a young man brought a bucket of water with some cloths to wrap Clarke's feet.  He also gave them each an apple, dark green and hard.  When Bellamy raised his eyebrows (becausewhat the fuck kind of dinner was this) the boy's shrugging response was clear: eat and be grateful.

 

Night fell and a breeze picked up across the river, sweeping chill air through the streets of the village to wind between the small log houses.  Hopefully this alliance would mean a couple of those wool blankets, or the night was going to get a lot more uncomfortable.  Bellamy leaned against the wall of the leader's house, and closed his eyes to imagine away the sound of argument within.  These people were Earth's version of the fucking Council for all he knew, deciding if the troublesome prisoners lived or died.  

 

The princess could have her fantasies about this place, but humans were all the same, even on the ground.  What they needed was to get out of here.  They just had to find—

 

"Bellamy, wake up."

 

A blaze of yellow light sliced across his vision, and he jerked at the sound of Clarke's command.  One hand fell to his long-knife, while he tried to piece together what he was seeing.  Like two sphinxes at the gates of Thebes, Yesenia and the boy stood before him with torches, their faces bland in the jumping, flickering darkness.  Between them, with her palm outstretched, Clarke Griffin of the Sky People grinned at Bellamy.  The whites of her eyes picked up the dancing fire, and her own two feet held her upright once again.

 

"Come on, lazybones, there's a hut with our name on it."

 

When he licked his lips to speak, the faint sting sharpened and calmed him at the same time.  "Dubious Foreigners?"

 

"That's the one."

 

Backlit this way, Clarke's golden shape blocked out all the stars, and Bellamy found he didn't miss them at all.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What a perfect cap to his evening: now Clarke was laughing at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the feedback gais! This fic comes with a playlist, enjoy it [here](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRCz1SK3IuAHz0vtmM_UlnYVsoJXlJYut). It's the music I wrote to.

The prisoner's hut turned out to be a one-room cabin with a dirt floor, a thatch roof, and no furniture.  Whatever it had been used for in the past—or whoever had lived in it—they were out of the picture now, judging by the dust.  When Yesenia opened the door and led them inside, she had something for each guest.  Guest or prisoner, depending on who was being asked.  Bellamy was given a stack of blankets, all various grades of heavy wool, and Clarke a single, yellow-brown candle affixed upright in an ancient-looking tin can. 

 

The torches remained outside, and with their tiny light source, Bellamy could barely make out a single bed. "Hey," he began, turning to the Grounder woman before she could leave.  Over the blankets in his arms he could see Yesenia's eyebrows climb up to her brow.   "That's not—"

 

A small hand curled around his elbow, and the complaint dried up on his tongue.  His gaze dropped to Clarke, who gave a minute shake of her head.  Conscious of her fingers on his arm and the aching weariness running through his muscles, Bellamy sighed and met Yesenia's stare.

 

"Thanks," he ground out. "Night."

 

As she closed the door behind her, they heard the audible crunch of a barricade lock being shoved into place.

 

"We can sleep on this," said Clarke as she approached the floor mattress, which was really more of a large sack of various leather hides, all stitched together and stuffed with straw and pine needles.  "It's nicer than anything we had at the drop ship."

 

The sight of her toeing their 'bed' with her foot and then rolling her shoulders as she stripped off her jacket was enough to suck all the air from Bellamy's throat. He clamped his mouth shut, then opened it again, and said something stupid.   "You sure your delicate reputation can handle this, Princess?"

 

She snatched a blanket from him, swiping him in the face with the scratchy fabric as she yanked on it.  "Can we just sleep please?  I'm too tired to fight right now."

 

Mindful that they had no matches to speak of, Clarke set the candle down on the floor a ways away, then spread the first blanket over the mattress as a cover.  Still not looking at him, she muttered under her breath, "Since when are you such a prude anyway."

 

There were about a thousand and one answers to that question, but Bellamy settled for shutting up and taking his boots off.  When he joined finally Clarke on the bed, they lay side by side, staring up at the wood slats of the ceiling.  The heavy blankets were warm enough, and the room was silent in a way that campsites for Jaha or the drop ship almost never achieved.  Village sounds were almost nonexistent at this hour, leaving only the insects outside and the wind rustling over the roof.  He inhaled: dust on top of animal hide on top of the dirt of the mountains.  Somewhere under all that, was the raw scent of the girl next to him.  It wasn't pleasant, but it was familiar and human.

 

"How's your head?  Dizzy?"

 

"It's fine. I don't have a concussion or anything."

 

"If you say so."

 

"I do. I'm putting out the candle, okay?"  When he didn't object, she sat up, blew it out, then laid back down so that their shoulders barely touched.   As Clarke pulled the blankets close around them and tried to make herself comfortable on the rough mattress, he felt every subtle shift of her indecision.

 

Both of them were competing to see who could pretend the hardest to be asleep when Bellamy's empty stomach burbled.  The low, pathetic sound filled the pitch blackness of the room.  He hadn't fully realized his body was capable of anything that loud.

 

She tried her best to stifle it, but a clear giggle escaped from the lump beside him.   What a perfect cap to his evening: now Clarke was laughing at him. He had mentally worked himself up to a smart retort when thin, questing fingers found his hand under the blankets.  They curled through his own, warmer and softer than anything he'd touched in the longest time.

 

"Good night Bellamy," she whispered, and he squeezed her hand, not quite ready to let go.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> re-post of the original 4th chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the confusion! This fic isn't being updated: it's finished. But like a silly person I was fumbling with my phone at 4am and accidentally deleted the chapter. Luckily I had a backup, so here we are again. If you're just reading this fic for the first time, it's intact now. Thanks for stopping by!

The next day gave Bellamy a crash course in activities he'd never imagined beyond storybooks, much less as real possibilities for someone born on the Ark.

 

By the time they were up that morning the lock on the door was off, and two buckets of water with a cloth and extra bandages were left just outside.  Beside the buckets sat a pair of leather shoes, well past used.  Clarke changed the wraps on her feet first, then they traded off waiting outside while the other person attempted to wipe down their body with the remaining water.  Bellamy hadn't felt this clean since before they left on the raid.  One full night and day of tramping through the forest with almost no breaks had left dirt in places that made even standing uncomfortable.

 

He was game to leave right then—just start walking toward the edge of the village and seeing if anyone had the gumption to stop him—but it became apparent the Shenandoah weren't ready to let them go for another day or so.  Seemed their fates were on hold while the Grounder top brass debated the wisdom of an alliance with the Sky People. 

 

"Trouble in paradise," he said to Clarke as they stood, again, in the center path through the town, this time eating small loaves of tasteless cornbread.  "They still might kill us, you know."

 

"They won't," she insisted, wiping crumbs from the corner of her mouth then letting her tongue dance out to lick them off her thumb.  On Earth, as in space, every calorie was precious. "They know we've got firearms back home and they want us on their side.  I think they must get raided a lot by the other clans."

 

Clarke wasn't exactly standing beside him this morning; she sat on a granite rock with her legs outstretched and her feet canted outward.  Bellamy allowed his eyes to drift up and down her shape, from the scabbed cut on her forehead to the way she didn't put weight on the balls of her feet.  Another day wasn't the worst that could happen.  At least they were already past the rescue window for mountain raids, so no one would be endangered trying to come after them.

 

While he watched her, Clarke was watching a building across the street and several huts down.  People passed in and out every few minutes, some of them familiar.  In a delicate, almost hopping motion, she was on her feet.  Chin up, she started toward the hut, and the guard watching both of them from a distance didn't even twitch to stop her.

 

"Where the hell are you going?" Bellamy snapped, darting in front of her.  Clarke moved deceptively fast for a wounded person.

 

"To help them with their wounded," she stated.  Then she stepped forcefully around him and walked off in the direction of wherever she pleased.  Because that was what Clarke's favorite thing to do. 

 

This was her great adventure, and the rest of them were all just living in it.

 

It was embarrassing how long Bellamy stood there with no idea where to go: a lanky fool cooking under the morning sun.  After a few minutes of feeling useless, he saw a group of men and women carrying massive wool bundles, two persons lifting each one.  A word rose from years of antiquated Earth education: wool came in bales, as did hay and other materials.

 

Stuffing the last of his cornbread in his mouth, Bellamy eyed the position of their guards. One remained on him, while another had discreetly set up camp near the hospital door.  Clarke was safe, for the time being.  With his best fuck-you grin, Bellamy waved a careless middle finger at his babysitter and headed off to join the wool handlers.

 

Midday found Bellamy standing knee-deep in mud and holding down a squealing sheep while a bearded tower of muscles named Mason screamed at him in a Spanish-laced Grounder dialect.  Mason didn't speak English—at least not to Bellamy—but it turned out English wasn't all that important to birthing livestock.  Amongst the four people shouting at each other and the struggling mother, there was an added distraction of the dog. 

 

Brown and mottled with black, it danced between everyone's feet, snapping at Bellamy more than anyone else.  The creature was downright ugly, with two tails and an unformed fifth leg peeking through its belly fur.  Unfortunately, mutation didn't make the beast any less aggressive or rambunctious.  It took nearly all of Bellamy's good upbringing not to kick it in the side.   Better to get used to the thing now. His sister would flip when she found out there will still dogs around, and sooner than later she'd probably end up at the gates of Camp Jaha with a half dozen named things like Blood Tooth or Razor.

 

Working with the animal keepers was exhausting, but it was a novel experience to have people looking at him for something other than life and death decisions.  He checked on Clarke in the afternoon, relieved to see her on a stool, bent over the bruised arm of a Shenandoah child.  She nodded him with a quick smile, then returned to her task.

 

No one would tell Bellamy what was going on with Yesenia and the village leadership, so eventually he went back to Mason's crew and learned how to sheer wool.  He was terrible at it, but he was also pretty sure he could explain the process to someone who'd be better suited.  Margot, a fifteen year old from the original delinquents, was the best knife handler and the most practiced at skinning animals.  If it weren’t so dangerous, Bellamy nearly wished she were here to get a lesson directly.

 

As he passed a flat knife along the hide of the docile animal, stopping often to re-sharpen the blade, his brain was trapped in a loop. One memory in particular circled on itself like an ouroboros, constantly bringing him back to that morning.

 

He'd woken stiff and cramped, still flat on his back, with Clarke curled on her side next to him.  His hand was trapped under her arm, and his neck had turned awkwardly to one side.  All he could see were the light waves of her hair, and his mouth was barely kissing distance from her shoulder.

 

Unlike most of the adolescents he was more or less in charge of, Bellamy understood the importance of not reading into shit that wasn't there.  With this in mind, he'd closed his eyes again rather than stare at Clarke while she slept.  He lay, unmoving at her side, until she stirred and threw off her blankets to face the day.  She rose without speaking, but there was one moment—a fraction between her waking and rising—when Bellamy was sure Clarke had been the one watching him.

 

As evening fell he made his way back to the center of the village, looking for her.  The rest of the Shenandoah were more generous with their food, so he felt full for the first time since the Ark dropped.  When he got to the make-shift hospital, he was stopped outside by one of the villagers.  After a few minutes of vehement gesticulation from the older man, Bellamy understood that she was busy in surgery.  Conscious of the guards always watching, he stuffed his hands in his pockets and leaned against the wall of the tiny hut.  Inside, someone was moaning as other voices jumped back and forth: English; the villager’s tongue; inarticulate sounds of human pain. 

 

It was an hour and a half past sundown when Clarke staggered out of the one-room hospital with someone else's blood on her shirt and her hands wringing in her hair.  Bellamy called her name, but she vanished toward their cabin, her new moccasins absolutely silent on the dirt paths of Shenandoah. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It wasn't a thing they did—give comfort—but hell, touching was happening right and left these days. Like too many things, it was easier in the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has commented or left kudos! One more chapter after this one. Note the rating change. ;)
> 
> As I was doing this chapter, I thought I'd formalize my writing playlist for y'all to listen to as you read. If you're starting the whole story, listen to the playlist [from the start](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRCz1SK3IuAHz0vtmM_UlnYVsoJXlJYut). But if you're jumping in at this chapter, you might want to begin at [this song by the Oh Hellos](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5s0oB1EzpA&index=7&list=PLRCz1SK3IuAHz0vtmM_UlnYVsoJXlJYut):
> 
>  
> 
> _He said to me, child, I’m afraid for your soul_  
>  _These things that you’re after they can’t be controlled_  
>  _This beast that you’re after will eat you alive_  
>  _And spit out your bones_

He pushed through the doorway to absolute blackness.  Nobody trusted them with their own torches, and as the door slipped shut behind Bellamy the last of the light was swallowed up.

 

“Clarke?”  In the corner, a tight, hitched breathing gave her away.  “C’mon, Clarke. I can’t see for fucking shit in here.”

 

“So go outside.”

 

In three strides he had her; his outstretched fingers met her hair, then the sleeve of her grimy nylon jacket.  His fingers twisted into the fabric and held, like someone lost in a parade.  “What happened back there?”

 

When she shuffled in retreat, Bellamy found her other elbow and cupped it in his hand, staying her.  It wasn't a thing they did—give comfort—but hell, touching was happening right and left these days.  Like too many things, it was easier in the dark.

 

She choked, “I can’t—”

 

“Just say it.”

 

"They took his _kidney_ , Bellamy.”  Her arms shuddered under his grip, and he could almost hear the chatter of her teeth.  “Levi.  He—he walked back with us, god knows how.  He was missing a kidney, and two weeks ago they took part of his liver.”

 

“Clarke.”  He found her shoulders, then ran his palms up and down the distance to her elbows.  Instead of this calming her down, her whole body screwed up even tighter.  Words launched out of Clarke, as if she hadn't the breath to catch up to them.

 

“Did you know this isn't even his village?  Now he’s dead and oh _god_ , we still have twenty-seven people in there!  Miller, and Lindsey, and Carlo.  Our blood is as good to them as the Grounders, maybe better.  Carlo’s only thirteen."

 

It sounded like she was full-on sobbing now, and no consolations he could pull out of his ass were getting through.  “Hey, hey.  Clarke, you can’t think that way.”

 

She inhaled, a shrill whooshing sound, and her voice pleaded for him to fucking get it.  "Bellamy I had my _hands_ inside him when he hemorrhaged.  And I wasn't the first one there."

 

Shaking his head was useless; she couldn't see him, and yet… "You’re not responsible for—"

 

"No, they're responsible!”  The accusation reverberated in the ramshackle room as she backed away, pushing off his contact.  “They’re responsible for every horrible thing that’s happened to these people.  And now they have our friends too.  They’re going to drain us and kill us and cut up our bodies to fix themselves and—"

 

“Damn it, Clarke, listen to me!”  Bellamy made a fresh grab for her hands, caught them swinging in the pitch dark, and fisted them tight to his chest.  His hands fully encompassed the breadth of hers, pressing them against the muscles over his heart.

 

“They won't do it,” he promised, “because we'll stop them.  We will stop them.”

 

She tugged backward, but he wouldn't let go, curling his fingers to feel the shape of her knuckles digging into his threadbare shirt.  “Bellamy, you can't know...”

 

"Listen to me when I say this, Clarke, because I need you to hear it.  We _will_ get our friends out, and the Grounders too.”

 

A shiver ran through his friend, right to her fingertips, and if it hadn't been for the darkness Bellamy might not have even realized he'd begun sliding his thumbs across the back of her wrists. 

 

“We'll do it, Clarke.”  Leaning in, he wished he could simply pour all of his faith and confidence into her.  Every scrape and bruise from Earth, every drop of blood, every burning muscle from every fight since they landed in this magnificent, horrible world: she needed it.

 

“ _Bellamy_.”

 

“We'll get every single person out of that place."

 

Clarke pulled away, and he thought that was it, he'd failed this too, when small, strong arms circled his neck and yanked him down.  

 

She sought him in the dark, their noses bumping along the way.  Clarke kissed his cheek first, then the side of his mouth. By the time her lips found his, Bellamy had both hands around her waist and it was mutual contact: all warmth and softness clashing with avidity.  He bit her bottom lip; she pushed her tongue inside his mouth, shoving him back a step until he nearly tripped on the soft lump of their bed.

 

The sensation of her astonished him: in the absence of light it felt as if Clarke were everywhere, all around him and constantly demanding he give more.  Bellamy maneuvered the two of them into the bed, his hands riding up beneath her shirt and jacket to touch the naked skin of her back.  She grabbed his collar, then slid her mouth in a slick trail over his jawline.

 

"Fuck,” he breathed. Clarke’s lips on the pulse of his throat had never been a fantasy before, but he doubted he’d be able to touch that spot again without remembering this.  Bellamy moaned, head tilted back, while her hands climbed up his chest in a mockery of where he’d held them before.  The scrape of her nails pulled a hiss out of him, so he grabbed her wandering fingers and pushed them back against the rough mattress.  His vision had finally adjusted to the dark, and beneath him Bellamy could make out the faint outline of her eyes.

 

She had a leg on either side of him, his center weighed down hers, and they were both panting.

 

“Now?  Here?"

 

Clarke nodded—he could barely see it—then enunciated a rough, "Yes."

 

They fumbled to strip their clothes off in the dark: Bellamy dragged her pants down in one sweep, his knuckles running along the length of her legs as he went.  Clarke tried to unzip his jacket, then helped him shove it off when the latch caught half-way.

 

Free, he fell forward over Clarke, hands braced on either side to kiss her.  The night air hadn’t completely cooled yet, and the top blankets were still bundled somewhere to the side.  But the blanket beneath them was old and soft; Bellamy’s elbows dug into it as he kissed her the way he’d only let himself imagine in his most private snatches of thought.  He’d gotten too good at locking away any inkling of genuine desire, shoving it down and smothering it to deal with tomorrow, next week, hopefully never.

 

Somehow he’d ended up here anyway, with Clarke chasing his tongue as if this were a real fight and she thought she could win.

 

Bellamy shifted his weight to one arm, not lifting his lips from hers as he reached for a blanket in the dark and dragged it over both of them. It slid down his back, covering only their legs, but it was something. Then he moved again and found her center, warm and wet as he explored.  She broke from his kiss to gasp as he rubbed her clit with his thumb and pushed one finger inside. 

 

For a moment, aggravation swept through him that he wasn't allowed to see this.  He could feel Clarke beneath him but he couldn't memorize the pale sweep of her throat as she moaned, or watch the rise and fall of her breasts.  He reacted to this staggering and unsatisfied want by kissing her again, as his hand pumped with two fingers, then three.

 

“What do you want?” he panted in her ear. “Clarke, talk to me.”

 

She keened, “This, keep doing this,” so he moved his fingers faster while he dropped open mouth kisses along her throat, her chin, and her ear.   When she came it was quick, faster than he'd've thought, and he knew the moment it happened.  She dug her fingers into the skin of his ribs as she tried to stretch out beneath him, her whole body a livewire, and he changed the motion on his hand enough to push her past the edge. 

 

Clarke let out a sound somewhere between a moan and a squeak as she tipped into ecstasy.  It left Bellamy shuddering above her with a punishing desire and the smug knowledge that he had drawn that sound from her.

 

“Off,” she ordered, her voice almost a tremble, and Bellamy let his hand glide over her stomach as he slid off to her side.  He squinted to see her in the dark, but he could find only hints: a flash of motion, a near invisible gleam of eyes.

 

“Well,” he murmured, stroking the soft expanse of her torso. “That was fun. Did—”

 

His attempt to brag was cut short when Clarke climbed on top of him, pushed his chest back, and sank right fucking down on him like they had done this a hundred times before.

 

“Shit,” he said, grabbing her hips and pushing up to meet the tight, encompassing warmth of her.  “Shit, Clarke.  You didn't have to—shit.”

 

“Stop saying shit,” she hissed, and raised herself only to push down again.

 

He grasped for something else, unable to put words together as she rolled her hips above him.  He tried, but all he could manage was a half-sarcastic, half-sincere, “Holy shit.”

 

“Bellamy—”  This time he didn't let her finish, sitting up enough to smash their mouths together in a hungry mess of a kiss.

 

“Hold onto me,” he commanded, then he pushed up, hard and fast, until they moved together in a cascade of bodies shifting over earth.  When Clarke came a second time it was different, a sharp shiver from her core that drove her to lock legs around his hips and slam her pelvis down.  She leaned backward and sucked in air like she was starving for it.  Bellamy followed moments later: he pressed his body up to meet her, with one hand cupping her breasts while the other splayed across the arch of her back.  His heels dug into the blanket-covered ground for purchase, kicking out then splaying to one side as Clarke collapsed on top of him.

 

Her head found its place tucked beneath Bellamy’s chin, and she swung her arm up to drag trembling fingers through his sweat-damp hair.  They breathed together, still joined, in cooling darkness.

 

 

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few minutes more of walking brought them to a miniature creek, barely worth hopping over. Bellamy paused before the trickle of water, spinning all the way around and planting his feet. "You know, this doesn't have to be so weird."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   
>  _Lady, running down to the riptide_  
>  _Taken away to the dark side_  
>  _I wanna be your left hand man_  
> 
> _I love you when you're singing that song_  
>  _And I got a lump in my throat_  
>  _'Cause you're gonna sing the words wrong_

Clarke beat him out of bed the next morning.  He woke to the sound of the wooden door being pushed shut behind her, which left him naked in a darkened, windowless room.  Slivers of white light stabbed into the cabin from the edges of the door and the weaker areas of the roof. 

 

Bellamy rooted around for his clothes, put on his shoes, then glanced at the door.  Odds put it that Clarke was just outside, changing her bandages or overthrowing the village authority.  After a long stare, he decided to fold the blankets and straighten the lumpy mattress into the corner.  In the process, he found their lost candle; it had broken off its tin tray and rolled into a depression in the dirt floor.  After a minute of trying vainly to smash it back into place, he gave up and set it on the pile of blankets for the next person to deal with.

 

“Alright, chicken-shit,” he said to the dusty air. “There’s literally nothing left in this room to fix.”

 

When Bellamy finally pushed open the door, he saw Yesenia and Clarke curled together over a square stretch of material that Clarke held up while the other woman pointed and whispered.  Clarke looked over, raised her eyebrows, and gave him the get-over-here nod.

 

It turned out that pulling Yesenia Moreno from of a pit of corpses beneath Mount Weather was the best decision Clarke or Bellamy had made in weeks.  Not only did she negotiate them permission to leave, she got them a map, two food packs, and a formal offer of alliance for Chancellor Griffin.

 

“This is incredible,” Clarke said two hours later as they marched through the underbrush just past the crest overlooking Shenandoah.  She wasn’t talking to Bellamy; he'd figured that out the first time.  “Incredible,” she repeated to herself as she studied the hand-written vellum document.

 

Bellamy had skimmed the alliance offer back in Shenandoah, and aside from penmanship, it wasn’t all that stunning.  In terms of civic discourse it was perfunctory and limited, with enough perks to make a genuine enticement to the cold and hungry Ark survivors.  Yet Clarke was back there cooing over it as if she’d been handed a lost treatise of Aristotle.  Bellamy had always been skilled at reading the room, and he didn’t need a giant flashing sign to tell him when a woman wanted to be alone.  Unfortunately, a whole morning of stilted negotiation atop a vague silent treatment had left him squirrely and unsettled.  

 

“How are your feet?” he asked over his shoulder.  A few paces behind him, Clarke replied as if she were reciting from a textbook.

 

“Fine.”

 

“Let me know if we need to stop.”

 

“I will.”

 

A few minutes more of walking brought them to a miniature creek, barely worth hopping over.  Bellamy paused before the trickle of water, spinning all the way around and planting his feet.   "You know, this doesn't have to be so weird."

 

Clarke halted too and looked at the ground, the creek, even trees just behind him.

 

“From here it looks like you’re the one making it weird.”

 

“Really?”  He advanced till barely a pace separated them.  “You’re right, it’s been a real challenge having to ignore myself all morning.”

 

“Okay, you’ve got a point.  I’ll try to be more pleasant.”  She bit down on her lip in deep, introspective thought, as if reflecting on all her earthly sins, and it would’ve been adorable if Bellamy wasn’t a hundred percent sure it was bullshit.

 

“Look, Clarke, you don’t have to be _pleasant_ for me.  I know you’re dealing with a lot, and this hasn’t been my favorite week either.  Just don’t—”

 

“I was sad, okay!” she snapped.

 

“What?”

 

Clarke’s mouth fell open, then her bottom lip wobbled, and she blurted, “Last night, I was sad.  That’s what happened.  I'm sorry, Bellamy.  I was sad and scared.  And you were—were—”

 

Sweet stars over the fucking Earth, Clarke was about to cry in front of him. 

 

Little blond strands stuck to her forehead in the humid air, and her shoulders shook as she waved back and forth between them in some see-sawing, incommunicable gesture.  Under the dappled light of the forest, she looked every inch of eighteen.

 

As Bellamy gaped, Clarke dropped her head into her hand and half-sniffled, "I can't believe I did this _twice_."

 

He did the math, and okay, that stung, but as Bellamy stared at the way her frizzy hair made a halo around her face, a bigger feeling took up residence in his chest.  Last night, they’d slept together.  Two days before, he’d carried her almost twelve miles beneath these selfsame trees.  The girl standing in front of him right now had shown more vulnerability over the last three days than she had in the entire two months they’d known each other. 

 

In a fucked up way, it was his privilege, because Bellamy was confident that today, right in _this_ moment, he knew Clarke Griffin better than anyone in the colony.

 

A laugh climbed up his chest, but having been brought up by two women, he turned it into a snort at the last second.  If he was screwed already—and he was way past screwed, she had no idea—then so be it.  He adjusted the balance of his pack, and slipped his knife into its sheath on his waist.

 

"Can I give you some advice, Princess?"

 

As Clarke raised her eyes to meet his, her brows pulled together in a contrary expression that he would never get tired of seeing.  Before she could retort, he crossed the remaining distance between them and kissed her.

 

Bellamy didn’t really believe in holding back, not when he needed to leave an impression.  He had one hand on her cheek, the other wrapped around her head in a position that brought up vivid memories of the night before, when she surrounded him in darkness and they rutted in a stranger’s cabin.  Clark’s lips parted with a gasp, and he added some tongue on the principle that if this were the last time she let him kiss her, he might as well make it a good and dirty one.

 

It turned out to be very dirty kiss, and not solely on his end.

 

When he finally pulled back, her hands were clamped in white fists at her sides, and they were both breathing hard.  Bellamy let his fingers slide away from her skin, touching first her shoulders, then patting down her collar.

 

Blinking, Clarke gawked at him. 

 

He brushed a leaf from the front of her jacket, and advised, "Next time, don't wait until you're sad." 

 

With measured steps, Bellamy retreated, turned, and began once more the long hike home.  He stepped across the trickle of a creek, listening to the burble of water over tiny branches and pebbles.  Casually, he swiped a leaf from a low-hanging branch and brought it up to his nose to smell, grinding the green material between his fingertips.  The sun hadn’t climbed to its midday zenith yet, and they had enough food to make it back to Camp Jaha without a hunt. 

 

Behind him, the splash of Clarke stomping vindictively in the creek rose above the birdsong, and Bellamy smiled at the trees ahead.


End file.
